


Hometown Blues

by appleblossomgirl



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Battling suicidal depression, F/M, Home and heart repairs, Musician!Katniss, baker!peeta
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-11
Updated: 2018-01-11
Packaged: 2019-02-23 08:30:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13186281
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/appleblossomgirl/pseuds/appleblossomgirl
Summary: After fleeing her hometown in the wake of a family tragedy, Katniss returns from years on the road to face her past, her memories, and the blue-eyed boy she'd never been able to forget.Rated M for sexual situations and brief mentions of self-destructive behaviors including drug use, promiscuity and an abandoned suicide attempt.





	Hometown Blues

**Author's Note:**

> This story was originally posted the ms2sl summer 2017 edition. Many thanks to the ms2sl ladies for all of their work to use stories to battle childhood cancer. 
> 
> My continued eternal gratitude to Xerxia for being the best beta, banner-maker and friend a girl could ask for.

She stared at the faded red house, taking in the chipped paint, the moss growing on the roof, the gutter hanging at a rakish angle, it was definitely a bit worse for wear, but still standing, just like her. Her father had built that house with his own hands. She had been born there, as had Prim. She knew with crystalline certainty that they had been happy here. She crammed down the he tumult of emotions that rioted in her heart, look a deep breath and put one foot in front of the other until she reached the front door. She tried and failed to ignore that her father’s old boots still stood propped against the side of the porch.

As she muscled her guitar case and shoulder bag through the front door, Katniss stopped and breathed in deeply, savoring the smell of evergreens and woodsmoke and that indescribable home smell that, even after all these years, made the tension in her shoulders relax. Damn, it was good to be home. And it pissed her off.

Having spent the last five years traveling around the world, she was amazed at how just the smell of a place, the quality of light, the way the neighboring woods muffled the sounds of the surrounding world, could be so unequivocally home. And how a house, even an empty, abandoned one, one that she had fled from like it was on fire, could feel like a solace.

He came unbidden to her mind in the wake of the word home, but she gently pushed the thought of him away. That was done now. She’d destroyed that piece of her home, obliterated it so thoroughly that it had taken years to let the dust settle, to rebuild her heart enough to risk coming back here.

When her mother, now living abroad, had called to suggest they sell the old house, Katniss had gritted her teeth that this job, like so many others, had fallen on her shoulders. But she also know it was time. It was probably also time to try to forgive her mother, but Katniss wasn’t even sure what she was supposed to forgive her mother for at this point. For leaving her children on the verge of starvation when her mother disappeared into her grief after Katniss’ father died? For surviving the accident? For running away and leaving Katniss alone again? Katniss sighed. One thing at a time, and today was the house.

As Katniss finally pulled herself through the front door, like a cork released from a bottleneck, she was shocked when Madge’s head poked out of the kitchen. Katniss’ bag slipped off her shoulder and landed with a thump on the floor.

Her friend’s face lit up with surprise and delight as she asked, “What are you doing home?”

“I had a break in my schedule and,” but she didn’t finish the sentence, not knowing how to say that it was just time. Time to come home, deal with house. Time to face her demons. Time to deal with the disaster of a broken heart that had made her a refugee from the place she loved most. Or should she tell Madge that she’d been dreaming of home for the past six months. She couldn’t kick the niggling thought that somehow Prim wanted her to come home. Since she couldn’t say any of those things, she pressed her lips together and shrugged.

“Sorry, of course you don’t need a reason, it’s your house! It’s just such a surprise to see you,” Madge said, squeezing Katniss into a tight embrace. “A wonderful surprise,” she added with a smile, “C’mon, I’m just making breakfast.”

Perplexed, Katniss followed Madge into the kitchen. She was grateful that her friend had kept an eye on the Everdeen house for past several years, she was just surprised that there was any kind of food in the house.

But as Madge placed a steaming mug of strong black tea and a bowl of yogurt with strawberries in front of Katniss, she was nothing but grateful. She couldn’t remember the last time she had eaten something so simple and good.

“Tell me everything,” Madge said breathlessly, settling across from Katniss at the worn kitchen table, “What’s it like being a rock star?’ Katniss glanced up just as Madge’s blond hair fell across her face, and Katniss let herself believe for one excruciating second that it was Prim sitting across from her. The derisive snort at being called a rock star died in her throat. She stared at the strawberries, watching the morning sun glisten off them like jewels until her breathing steadied and the tears receded.

“You first,” Katniss said around the lump in her throat, “tell me everything I’ve missed.”

Madge gave her a small sympathetic smile and launched into a monologue detailing wonderfully mundane goings on in their small town. After the better part of hour and an entire pot of tea, Katniss felt caught up on all the local gossip, all except the person she most craved and dreaded hearing about.

“How’s Peeta?” Katniss asked quietly, trying and failing to maintain eye contact as she added, “How’s married life treating you?” It had only taken about a year and a half after her midnight flight to find out that Peeta and Madge had married. Whether she admitted it to herself or not, it was one of the reasons she'd stayed away so long.

She knew what she had done, had no delusions that he was hers, but she couldn't, even after five years away, imagine Peeta was anyone else's.

Madge's self-conscious throat clearing made Katniss look up. “It’s not. We split up last year. The divorce became final six months ago.” She shook her head, almost incredulously before explaining, “Yeah, I messed that up bad. I cheated, screwed a married guy,” she waved a dismissive hand and added, “no one you know, just some summer guy I met at the store. He was married too. I’ve been living here, which I hope is okay since you asked me to keep an eye on the place.” She gave a forced laugh as she shrugged and added, “I don’t know why I did it, but Peeta and I were never meant to be. I guess I just needed to decisively end it, you know?” She looked up curiously and Katniss was surprised to find herself on her feet.

She sat back down, shrugging apologetically. Her mind was racing, but the only coherent thought that seemed able to fight its way through was that she needed to see Peeta.

Madge glanced up at the clock and exclaimed that she was late for work. In a tornado of flowy skirts, clickety high heels and blond hair she grabbed her purse, blew Katniss a kiss and ran out the door.

Katniss began to pace. She should just let sleeping dogs lie. Just deal with the house and leave. But she felt like she needed to see him. Maybe she could just stroll by the bakery. Maybe he’d be sitting in the window, drinking tea. Maybe she could catch a wisp of his voice, a tendril of his warm laugh, a flash of his sky-blue eyes… Maybe that would be enough.

Swiping her keys off the table and sliding her feet into her well-worn boots, Katniss hopped off the front porch and started walking towards town, admonishing herself to slow down.

It was a couple of miles and she chastised herself the entire way there, telling herself that just because he and Madge had split up that was no guarantee he was single. And besides, it didn’t matter whether he was because he probably never wanted to talk to her again anyway after how she’d treated him. She turned back towards the woods twice, horrified by the memory of her behavior the last time she saw Peeta. But the promise of seeing him again, after she’d wished for a second chance with him a thousand times over the past five years, was impossible to ignore.

When she reached the bakery, she ducked into the alley feeling like she might throw up. She took several slow, deep breaths to calm her racing heart, employing the same techniques she used before stepping onstage. This didn’t have to be a big deal, she assured herself, just an old friend dropping in on a buddy. Staring down at her faded jeans and old, wrinkled, and now slightly sweaty, Ramones t-shirt with the hole in the left armpit, she wished she’d thought to change her clothes before barging in on him. But she was here now and if she lost her nerve, she wasn’t sure she’d have the guts to face him again. Tucking the wisps of hair that had come loose from her braid behind her ears, she pushed off the wall and walked up the steps to the bakery door and slipped quietly inside.

There were several people in line for the counter and she slid in behind them, effectively hiding while she studied her surroundings. The place had changed since she’d last been there and it had Peeta’s signature all over. It was warmth and comfort. It smelled like the ginger peach tea he had always loved. There was acoustic guitar music thrumming softly in the background. The floors had been restored to the original wood and custom cabinets had been built into the back wall so the loaves and baguettes hung like art. She loved it.

The thought that his hands had done this, had made this, had touched every surface made her want to run her open palms along each wood grain. Her face heated and she could actually hear her heart throbbing at the memory of his hands caressing her bare skin, sliding around her body to press her against him. She closed her eyes, remembering for one fleeting second how it had felt to belong to him.

Her eyes snapped open as he pushed through the swinging door from the kitchen. And then he was standing there, twelve feet away, with a cake in his hands. Katniss’ breath caught in her throat, she felt frozen in place. Was it possible that he was even more beautiful? His face had lost the boyish roundness and his shoulders, always broad, were straining against the cotton of his shirt as he gently placed the cake on the counter. As he was busy packaging the confection, she studied him. He had a small streak of blue paint on his earlobe. Though his smile was as warm as ever, it didn’t light up his eyes like it used to. And those eyes. She had dreamed of them thousands of times, thought she knew every expression that lay hidden in their stormy-sea depths. But the weariness she saw there, accented by the dark circles like thumbprint bruises beneath his eyes, was new.

The urge to wrap him in her arms, to run her fingertips over those dark smudges, to feel his solidity under her hands came on so swiftly she was grateful there were several people dividing them lest she have lunged across the counter and clung to him like a desperate barnacle.

This was a terrible idea. Why had she come here? What did she think was going to happen? That he was going to welcome her home with open arms? Forgive her on the spot for her heartless betrayal, her cruelty. This was madness, barging in on him at work. She had needed to see him and she had. He was everything she remembered, more even, but it was madness to think he’d want to see her.

She backed away slowly, gently easing the door handle to keep the bell from ringing and turned to leave.

“Katniss?” he asked, his voice as rich and deep as she remembered it. He was still at the counter, but it sounded as though he was standing beside her. 

She froze, feeling like she’d been caught sneaking away from a crime scene. She supposed she had. She squared her shoulders and turned slowly towards him, bracing herself for whatever he had to say. God knew, she deserved it.

But when her eyes met his, it wasn’t the expected fury she saw. It was worse, it looked more like hurt.

“You’re home?” he asked.

She nodded, feeling incapable of explaining the nuances of her return when her voice didn’t seem to work. He waited and she realized she needed to respond. She cleared her throat and rasped out, “I’ve come to deal with the house.”

“What does that mean? Get rid of it?”

“I honestly don’t know.” It was overwhelming, talking to him like this. Choking out words when her heart felt like an open wound and the only true things she could communicate to him would require her lips on his skin. Why had she come here? What had she been thinking? She feared she would burst into tears at any second. She needed to get out of there before she broke down and begged his forgiveness in front of the entire town.

Seeming to sense her distress and miraculously wanting to spare her, he said curtly, “I’ll stop by later.”

“That’d be great,” she breathed in relief giving him a weak smile of gratitude.

He nodded, his expression unreadable, as he turned back towards his next customer.

Xxxx

When Katniss reached her driveway, she kept walking. Past the old fence that marked the timber company’s lands and into the forest. She hiked uphill until her legs and lungs ached. Collapsing onto a mossy stump, she dropped her head into her hands and let the memories she’d been holding at bay flood her mind.

_It was the night of the summer solstice. Everyone was so fixated on it being the longest day of the year that no one seemed to remember it was also the shortest night. But she was fixated on nightfall because she was meeting Peeta at the bonfire that night. And she was so nervous and excited, she could scarcely wait._

_They’d been dancing around each other for weeks, ever since he’d told her at grad night that he’d had a crush on her for years. Had been pining for her since kindergarten was how he’d put it. She had scowled at him, already punishing his hyperbole until she met his eyes and whatever snarky retort she had been about to deliver, died on her lips. Because he was looking at her in a way that electrified her, like lightning shooting through her veins. She couldn’t remember feeling so alive, certainly not since her father had died. In that dingy high school gym dressed up with fairy lights, standing on the free-throw line, he set her heart on fire._

_They spent as much time as possible together for those next few weeks, though it only amounted to stolen moments between summer jobs and family responsibilities. But every moment, every brush of his fingers, every shy, secret smile, made her heart race and her life feel infused with promise. He had kissed her for the first time the night before and she hadn’t stopped touching her lips all day, invoking the feel of his petal-soft kiss on hers._

_But that day was different, it was what she had been waiting for. Katniss’ mom had left at dawn to join Prim on a school-sponsored humanitarian aid mission to Haiti. For two glorious weeks, Katniss was going to have the house to herself. Her nights to herself. Even the thought of having him with her stoked the swarm of butterflies that had taken up residence in her stomach into a riot of flutters._

_She wore one of Prim’s flowy floral tops over her best jeans. She left her hair down since she’d noticed that Peeta couldn’t seem to stop touching the fringe of her braid and she wanted to feel his hands in her hair. Even the thought made her shiver._

_As the sun set, she made her way over to the bonfire at Abernathy’s farm. Everyone she passed was already tipsy and feeling the festivity of the night. There was something magical about a solstice, the warmth, the lingering light, the promise that accompanies a pinnacle, the expectation of weaving something ancient and magical out of the lingering rays of sun that streaked through the indigo sky._

_When she found Peeta in the crowd, he was already watching her, that impossibly sweet smile playing at his mouth, his eyes like tractor beams drawing her to him. She could have sworn under oath that she was caught in his orbit, pulled to him by something as undeniable as gravity. And when she finally reached him, stared up into his beautiful face, his luminous eyes lit by the last tendrils of the setting sun, she knew that this was it. From tonight on they would belong to each other._

_She stood near the fire, laughing with Madge, but she could feel him as he came up behind her. She shivered at his closeness and he must have thought she was cold. Or maybe he just needed to touch her as badly as she needed his touch. When he wrapped her in his jacket, pulling her against his broad chest, she was blissfully engulfed in his warmth. As he rested his chin on the top of her head and pressed her body against him, unable to get close enough, she knew that they belonged to each other. He was her home, grown from the same air and soil and rain. With a clarity of purpose she hadn’t felt since she was starving, she wanted to be alone with him._

_As the clock crept towards midnight, they made a plan. After his bakery shift early the next morning, they would spend the rest of the day, and night, together. The butterflies erupted in a riot of anticipation._

_But when she got home, Officer Darius was waiting on her porch. Her first thought was that he was there to check her sobriety, and she mentally inventoried the two beers she’d drank over the last few hours, assuring herself she was fine. But when he pulled off his hat and gripped it in both hands, she knew it was something worse. He stood on her porch, apologetically explaining that Mrs. Everdeen had asked him to come to explain the terrible accident that had befallen what was left of her family. There had been an ambush, a gunfight, an explosion. Hours before her mother’s arrival, Prim had been killed. The world disintegrated around her._

_She didn’t remember walking there as she crawled into Peeta’s bedroom window. He was sprawled out on his back, his thickly muscled arms thrown over his head. She stood frozen just inside the window, spellbound by his unspeakable beauty as he lay in a pool of moonlight._

_She should have left. Or curled up beside him, content with the warmth of his body and the steadiness of his breath. Or tried to explain. But she didn't. She said nothing about Prim, about the hole in her chest where her heart used to be, about how she wanted to burn the whole world down. Instead she straddled his thighs and left open-mouthed kisses from his neck to his belly button._

_When he asked her what was going on, she pressed a finger to his lips and rid them both of clothes. As she pulled him over her, she sucked him whole into her black hole of loss and misery. Because grief has nothing to share but loneliness and despair. So while he pushed inside her, chanting promises of always, she sought nothing but oblivion._

_And when he came, gasping and shaking above her, holding her face in both his trembling hands, she looked away. She couldn’t meet his eyes. Couldn’t answer a single hopeful question she saw them. She cheated him of the beauty he deserved. She stole his happiness like a cowardly pickpocket. She waited until his breathing evened and deepened into the cadence of sleep before slipping from his embrace. And like a thief in the night, she robbed him of the future he had hoped for._

_As raw as an open wound, she ran all the way home to her empty, sisterless house. She threw some clothes and a toothbrush into a duffle bag, grabbed her guitar and drove away from that life. Haymitch had offered her a job singing backup for some Indie band for one of the tours he promoted. She texted Madge asking her to tell Peeta she had left and to check on the house when she could. Then she turned her phone off and sank into darkness._

_The first year was a blur of hopelessness, random men and lots of drugs. She smoked, snorted or swallowed anything anyone put in front of her, not sure if she was hoping it would make her feel something or just end her. She slept with scores of random men, dark, faceless men in dark, nameless bars. Couplings not for pleasure, but rather fruitless attempts to stuff those men into her fathomless chasm of emptiness. Failed attempts to staunch the bleeding. When she became aware of that the encounters cost her more than they helped, she stopped._

_On a particularly dark day in District 4, when the pain felt like more than she could endure, she waded into the ocean until the waves lapped at her chest and the sand was stolen from beneath her feet by the relentless pull of the sea. She exhaled in relief as she finally gave up. She took a last gasping breath with Prim's name on her lips, lay back and sank into the darkness._

_She closed her eyes against the stinging salt and let her mind go blissfully blank. That was what she had wanted, an encompassing emptiness, a void without pain. Oblivion._

_But instead of the silence she was expecting, the ocean was another world unto itself. It was full of sound- the gurgle of bubbles and rasp of waves on sand. As her sodden denim clothes pulled her towards the sea floor, she still missed her sister and her father and her mother, or who they had all once been. When her lungs started to ache, to claw at her insides for air, she opened her eyes. It was the most transcendentally beautiful sight. The light was kaleidoscoping into shards of sunlight and the sky through the undulating sea was the exact color of his eyes. Peeta's eyes. She needed to see him again. She needed to live._

_She kicked hard against the soft bottom, shedding her jacket like a snakeskin as she fought for the surface. As she breached, she took heaving, greedy gulps of air._

_She crawled out of the sea, like a primordial creature, still sputtering, and collapsed on the beach. She was waterlogged and exhausted, but she was alive. With her cheek wet with sea and tears pressed into the warm, rough sand, she wrote the first verse of her first song._

_She was surprised to discover that writing it down helped. Singing to dark rooms full of strangers helped. So she kept it up, filling notebook after notebook with her pain._

_She stitched her soul back together, one song at a time. Every performance was an attempt to recapture that moment when she’d chosen the light over the depths, each song was an anthem of her love. Deep, abiding love for her father. Simple, incorruptible love for Prim. Tarnished, reluctant love for her mother. Unquenchable, bone-deep, heartbreaking love for the boy she’d given up._

_But she was a coward. It was both too soon and too late to reach out to him. Her life only strobed into focus when she was on stage, and soon she was signing a contract with a folk rock label and headlining at festivals. It was a rootless, lonely life, but it suited her, a rootless, lonely girl._

_When Madge excitedly texted her that she and Peeta were getting married, Katniss let out a breath she hadn’t even known she’d been holding. That was it then, there wasn’t any hope left. Even as her chest cracked open she heaved a resigned sigh of relief. It was over. He was going to have the life and love he deserved._

_That was almost four years ago. That time had been a blur of bus rides, hotel rooms, and hundreds of stages. Stages where, perched on a high stool, amidst the hot lights and stale cigarette smoke, she closed her eyes and allowed herself to remember. She spun her memories, wishes, regrets into songs like threads of gold. She wove musical tapestries from memories of the way her father’s voice traveled through thin mountain air. The crystalline, sharp-edged, gutting love that remembering Prim’s giggle still invoked. The way her mother always ran her hand over Katniss’ braid when she set down a mug of tea for her, that indirect touch the only way they had. The excruciating tenderness of Peeta’s callused fingertips caressing her skin._

_She poured out her soul on those stages and slowly knit her heart back together. And even though it felt more scar tissue than heart most days, it still beat doggedly, fiercely. And it still longed for the boy she’d left behind. She still saw that unendurable blue whenever she closed her eyes. Like his gaze was tattooed inside her eyelids, or, she suspected, on her soul._

"Ocean blue," she whispered to herself like a prayer, and it pulled her back to reality. She picked herself up from the forest floor and tipped her head back to see the wisps of blue sky through the branches of her beloved forest. She took a deep breath of mountain air, and once again chose life. She started home with the promise of seeing Peeta, even if for only a few fleeting, awkward moments, driving her feet forward.

When she saw the little house in the clearing, her heart soared with the recognition of home, then plummeted with the certainty of loss. She couldn’t allow herself to want it. To want this life. She had abandoned it and she couldn’t have it back. Without warning, her heart spiked with the thought of Peeta.

But she was insane to think that just because she had never stopped loving him, that Peeta had any interest in her whatsoever. He was probably just being his usual polite self dropping by to spare her the mortification of a public rejection. She owed Peeta an apology and so much more, but his forgiveness was more than she deserved.

She needed to stick to the plan. Do what she needed to do and get out of town, for good this time.

Peeta arrived at her house as the sun was dipping below the tree line. It was still sticky and warm, but the sky was starting to soften. She had showered and wore a faded red sundress that she found in her mother’s closet with her worn hunting boots. It made her feel different, like herself but with facets of her mother and Prim. And she realized that she carried precious pieces of both of them inside of her. For the first time in as long as she could remember, she thought of them both as people again, not just fragments of her broken heart.

Katniss watched from the front porch as Peeta slid out of his old pick up, solid and graceful, sure of his body in a new way. Instead of looking at her, he was shading his eyes and staring up at the roof.

“That gutter’s come loose,” he said impassively, gesturing with his chin.

“Hello to you too,” she said. She felt raw and sweaty and ridiculous for having worn the dress. What did she think was going to happen? That he was going to love her again? Her careful preparations seemed ridiculous now, embarrassing even. “So, what, you’re a contractor now?” she snapped.

“No, just pointing it out. You’ve never been very good at seeing what’s right in front of you. If you’re gonna sell the place, you’ll need to fix it up a bit.”

“I don’t have to do anything.” She felt defensive on behalf of the house and possibly herself as he walked up to the wall beside the porch.

“Suit yourself,” he shrugged, running a finger down the cracked siding.

“Did you come here to lecture me?” She felt close to tears again, but this time they were born of angry, hot, frustration.

He chuckled mirthlessly and rubbed the back of his neck. “I’m not entirely sure why I came, but it wasn’t to lecture you.” He glanced at her then. “I could help, if you wanted. Tomorrow around 2:00. Do you have a ladder?”

She bit back her natural response that she didn't need his help. This was all going so wrong so quickly that it made her dizzy. She had meant to apologize, to have him kindly and gracefully forgive her. And then she would leave District 12 forever, leaving all of her ghosts behind. But he was walking back towards his truck, glancing over his shoulder with eyebrows raised in question.

“I don’t know,” she said, realizing he was waiting to hear if she had a ladder.

“K, I’ll bring one. See you tomorrow.” And he climbed back into his truck.

She stood, baffled, fists planted on her hips as he backed around the porch in a graceful arc. When he stopped to switch gears, he was only a few feet away from her and she could see the golden hairs on his forearm as he leaned out the window, his eyes finally meeting hers as he said, “That’s a real nice dress, Katniss.” Then there was nothing but the crunch of gravel under his tires and the percussive thudding of her heart as he drove away.

“Damn,” she muttered to herself under her breath, scuffing the toe of her boot against the wood planks of the porch.

She walked back into the house and was surprised to see Madge walking towards her with a suitcase in one hand and a grocery bag in the other, hangers sticking out where they'd been carelessly thrust.

“Madge, what are you doing home? I thought you were at work.” Taking in Madge’s bags, she added, “You don’t need to leave.”

Madge waved her words away dismissively. “It’s frankly ridiculous that I’m still here. I think I’ve just been hiding. I’m gonna go stay with my daddy until I get my own place. It’s way past time.”

Katniss ran through the brief altercation she’d just had with Peeta, feeling like a perfect asshole for not considering her friend’s feelings, but not finding anything remotely improper in her and Peeta’s interaction.

Madge reached out and squeezed Katniss’ shoulder. “You know how I said before that I didn’t know why I cheated on Peeta. That’s not true.” She glanced away, roughly wiping away a sudden tear and huffing out a frustrated breath before fixing her watery eyes on Katniss’. “I wanted to feel like someone really wanted me. Even if it was a dumb fling. There’s nothing worse than being married to a guy who’s in love with someone else. He’s never gotten over you, Katniss, not even for a second. You two are meant to be together. For what it’s worth, you have my blessing. You’d be idiots not to give it a try.”

Incredulous, but with a heart swollen with gratitude, Katniss squeezed Madge’s hand. “I can’t see how that’s true, but you’re a great friend, Madge Undersee.”

“I am, aren’t I,” Madge asked with a bright smile and dainty sniff. “Lunch date on Thursday?”

Katniss hesitated, not wanting to make any plans, even just a few days out. But she couldn't possibly say "no" to Madge so she nodded and said, “See you at Sae’s.”

She spent the evening packing up random boxes of things; books off the bookshelves, her mother’s desk. She tried to focus on each task and keep her mind from wandering. It was after midnight when she collapsed into her childhood bed in complete exhaustion.

Waking up late the next morning, Katniss felt oddly hungover, like the emotions of the day before had depleted her in some vital way. She made a mug of tea, took it outside and walked around the house taking inventory, much like Peeta had. He was right, there were a number of things that needed to be addressed. She shouldn’t be surprised that the place had fallen into disrepair. It’d been a long time and she’d been neglectful. She made a list and drove into town for supplies.

As she piled caulk and gutter joints and a new drill into her cart, Katniss responded to the various nods and pats of greeting from her neighbors. She was surprised at how welcome she felt, how easy it was to fall back into place. When her old classmate Leevy rang her up at the register, she gushed about how excited they all were for her next album, how thrilled everyone in town was that she’d done so well out in the world, but that it was great to see her home. Katniss was thrown off guard when Thom, another high school acquaintance asked to take a photo with her. It wasn’t until old Mr. Cartwright asked after her mother that she bolted, unsure how to respond that she didn’t really know.

When she got back to the house, Peeta’s truck was already in the driveway. Damn, he was early.

“Hey,” she said as she grabbed the bag of tools from her car.

“Hey,” he responded, looking a little contrite and markedly more friendly than he had last night. He walked forward and took the bag from her arms. “Ready to get started?”

Her body hummed with his closeness and the brush of his hand against her arm. She swallowed hard and nodded.

Katniss was no slouch; she’d been fixing and/or jerry rigging house repairs since her father died. Her mother and Prim had had no trouble putting human beings back together, but they were hopeless when faced with a clogged drain or blown fuse. But as she and Peeta crossed things off the project list, she found herself marveling at how surprisingly handy he was. As he pulled off his sweaty denim work shirt revealing an equally sweaty white t-shirt that hugged his broad shoulders, thickly muscled arms that tapered down into those immensely capable hands, she couldn’t stop herself from wondering what else he might have gotten good at since she saw him last.

Her emotions felt like a tetherball match, swinging frantically back and forth between the sadness that each memory brought and the distraction of having Peeta so close.

As she fought the tide of sorrow that pulled at her whenever she missed Prim, she wanted badly to run. To escape the bottomless grief. But she couldn’t leave, not while Peeta was here helping her. Taking a shaky breath, she dropped the screwdriver and headed into the kitchen. While she drank a glass of water, she leaned against the doorjamb, absently running her fingernail over the growth chart she’d etched into the wood as Prim grew.

The memory of Prim standing against in the doorway, painfully thin and stick straight, a look of intense concentration in her dark blue eyes as Katniss marked her height on Prim’s ninth birthday, hit her hard. God, how Katniss had loved her then, fiercely, frantically aware of how close she’d come to losing her to their mother’s neglect. Katniss’ heart swelled painfully at the memory of twelve year old Prim bent over the kitchen table studying under the naked bulb, her lovely blond waves cascading over her left shoulder as she absent-mindedly fingered the ends. Katniss barely felt the tears start as she glanced into the living room, picturing fourteen year old Prim dangling backwards over the couch, giggling as she wound the phone cord around her finger. She heard the rusty-spring squeak of the screen door and could perfectly hear Prim calling her name in that deranged-with-excitement way only a six year old can pull off. But as she blinked through the tears it was Peeta standing in the doorway. His face contorted with concern as stepped towards her, asking, “Katniss, what is it?”

She threw herself into his arms, the sob already clawing it’s way up her throat. “I miss her so much,” she gasped before the tears stole her voice and her breath. She clung to Peeta as five years of suppressed grief wracked her body and he held her just as tight, murmuring words of comfort and cradling her head as she wept.

When the deluge of tears had ebbed to watery hiccups and she thought she could talk again, she rinsed her face in the sink and dried it with a dishtowel. Peeta stood, worry etched into every line of his face and waited. Throwing the towel over she shoulder, she grabbed two beers from the fridge and led him onto the porch. They sat side by side sipping their beers until she was able to say what she had come home to say.

“I’m sorry, Peeta.”

“For what?” he asked cautiously.

She took a deep breath and faced him. “For everything? For using you the night Prim died. For not being straight with you. For not being brave enough to tell you why I left. Maybe even for leaving.”

There was a painfully long pause while he stared out at the darkening sky before he asked, “Did you think I wouldn’t understand?” The hurt was palpable in his eyes. “Did you not trust me?”

“No. Nothing like that. I think I just went a little crazy.” She shrugged, but her shoulders felt heavy. After her mother, this was the hardest thing to admit. “I thought running away would help. I didn’t think I could survive here. I barely survived as it was.”

“I know,” he said. And she looked up from the label she was peeling from her bottle to make sure she’d heard right. “I’ve listened to your songs. Each one is at least half suicide note. I could barely stand to listen to them, but I also couldn’t stop.” His eyes searched hers as he leaned a bit closer, “It’s like everything with you. Even when it’s not good for me, I can’t stop wanting it.”

She looked down at her hands. He was right, she wasn’t good for him. She was the human equivalent of a sinkhole, a bottomless pit. “What about Madge?” she blurted out.

She couldn’t entirely believe what Madge had said about his feelings and wondered if there was even a flicker of hope that he could still love her.

He took another pull on his beer and looked out to where the forest was darkening into an indistinct mass. “I guess I thought it would help,” he parroted her words back to her with a wry smile. “That committing to someone completely like that would force my heart to love someone else. But I’ve come to understand that it doesn’t work that way. At least not for me. What I feel for you only happens once. In fact, I think once is more than most people get. Whether you meant to or not, you staked your claim and now I have to live with that. You’re it for me, Katniss.”

She took a shaky breath and whispered the only question that mattered, “Still?” Do you still want me?”

He licked his bottom lip as he stared back and forth between her eyes, searching for something. “I told you,” he breathed, “I can’t seem to stop.”

She closed the small space between them and pressed her lips to his. A small moan escaped her as his mouth opened beneath hers. He tasted of beer and chapstick, smelled of sunscreen and clean sweat, felt like forgiveness and hope. His kiss blotted out everything else. Finally she found the anchor she had been searching for. She needed more. She never wanted it to end. Trying to simultaneously put her bottle down and climb onto his lap, she spilled beer on her foot before pushing up to kneel in between his knees.

He ran his hand up her neck, weaving it into the hair at the base of her skull, which he gripped like he feared she would flee while his eyes were closed. And part of her did want to run, but she ignored it, willfully stomped it down and kissed him harder. It felt like the blood flow returning to an arm that has fallen asleep, gone numb, that pleasure/pain sensation that makes you suck in a breath. And like the rush of awakening, the revival of a deadened limb, her heart tingled and throbbed.

She wrapped her arms around his neck, needing the leverage to deepen the kiss that was already as deep as the sea. They kissed for minutes or hours, she wasn’t sure which, only that she needed more. But then he was pulling away.

She felt dazed and disoriented by the break in the kiss and she searched his eyes for the meaning of the rude interruption.

He squinted at her like he was trying to decipher a puzzle. He righted her, with steady hands on her waist, then nervously braced his hands on his thighs. “Dinner,” he said firmly. “I’m starving.”

She was hungry, but not as ravenous as she was for his touch. She felt cheated as he stood and walked into the house and she chastised herself for thinking he would just fall into her arms and want to stay there. Wanting someone and trusting them were two very different things.

Sighing, she dusted off her knees and followed Peeta into the house.

She could hear the telltale sounds of him already starting to cook, water running, cupboards closing, the insistent hiss and click of the gas burner as it lit. She needed a minute to collect herself so she wandered down the dark hallway, trailing her fingers along the wood grain to calm her racing heart.

She stopped at a picture still mounted on the wall, barely visible in the light from the kitchen. It was a picture of her mom, Prim and herself making various faces: her mother’s shy, embarrassed smile, Prim’s beatific grin, made all the more enchanting by two missing front teeth, and Katniss’ self-conscious smirk, eyes rolled exaggeratedly to the side. That’s what the picture showed. What it didn’t show was her dad behind the camera, clutching his heart with one hand as he exclaimed that they were the three most beautiful girls in the world. The memory stabbed at her, but also glowed.

She rested her forehead against the wall, taking deep steadying breaths. When she opened her eyes, Peeta was standing in the doorway of the kitchen, looking torn.

“Dinner’s ready,” he said softly.

“I didn’t expect it to be so hard, being back here. Or maybe I did.” She shook her head, feeling shaky and realizing how much she needed to eat. As she passed him in the doorway, he rubbed a small circle against the small of her back in the most comforting gesture. She was amazed at his generosity.

“Are you regretting coming home?” he asked, not meeting her eyes as he heaped the simple pasta dish crammed with cherry tomatoes, green beans and parmesan that he must have found in the fridge.

“I am,” she said. He nodded, but still didn’t look up, stirring his pasta around on his plate. She couldn’t stop herself from adding honestly, “And there’s nowhere else I’d rather be. Being here is a wound and a balm all at the same time.”

The look he gave her then was so naked with longing that this time she looked away.

What was she doing? As much as she wanted him, she couldn’t stay here. She couldn’t allow herself to hurt him again. Get in, get done, get out. She cleared her voice and forced herself to add, “I’ll really miss this place.”

They ate the deliciously simple meal in excruciating silence, suffused with all the things they couldn’t say.

After the dishes were dry, he offered to help her pack. As if there was no end to his kindness or her corresponding ability to endure it. They worked in different rooms, painfully aware of each other, but achingly separate.

At some point, she realized she hadn’t heard him for a while.

When she crept into the kitchen, following the dim light, she found Peeta hunched over the kitchen table. It took her a moment, as her eyes adjusted to the light, to see that he was drawing. She stood in the doorway, admiring the damp cotton of his shirt spread taut across his back. She watched as the long muscles undulated beneath the thin fabric. She followed the ridges up from his tapered waist to his broad shoulders, down to where the sleeves stretched tight around his biceps. He ran his hand over the top of his head before grasping the back of his neck. She wanted desperately to smooth the wrinkles in his shirt, to feel the flex of his muscles under her palms, to revel in the strength and solidity of him and the fact that he was actually there with her.

But she hadn't been invited to touch him and she knew better than to take anything more from him without permission. So she just stood in the doorway, wrapping the humid warmth of the night around her instead and relishing the rightness of having him so close.

At some point his pencil left the paper and she shuffled quietly in and poured him a glass of water from the sink.

He didn’t look up as he thanked her, cocking his head from side to side and using the edge of his pencil to shade parts of his drawing.

“I felt so empty, after you left,” he started as though picking up a thread of conversation, “Not just empty, but insubstantial. I felt like I was disappearing, like I could float away like a piece of goose down or a dandelion seed on the breeze. It was terrifying. I think I hoped that tying myself to another person, anchoring myself to someone else, would keep me tethered to this life. That’s why I married Madge.”

She had no idea what to say. She knew what it felt like to disappear into grief, to feel like a hollow shell rolling along the bottom of the sea with the whims of the tide. She cringed at the knowledge that she was the source of his pain. She took the few steps to reach him and waited, desperate to touch him, until he leaned into her. Relieved, she cradled his head against her belly, running her fingers through his hair.

He nodded against her. “We’re both broken, Katniss, but our jagged edges fit together. Please tell me you feel this too. I feel like I’m going crazy. Please say you want this.” There was a note of pleading in his voice which made her pretty sure she would have agreed to anything he asked.

“I’ve missed you so much, Peeta,” she murmured, leaning in to kiss his forehead. "You were the only one who ever made sense for me."

He tipped his head back and met her lips. There was something indescribably intimate about hovering over him like this, like he was praying to her, baring his throat, his heart, to her, utterly defenseless. But she didn’t want any imbalance between them. She climbed onto him and slid into his lap without breaking the kiss.

His hands were on her hips and as she rubbed and rocked over his growing erection, she wasn’t sure which of them was guiding her movements. They were of one mind, one need.

He lifted her onto the table, so she was perched on the edge before sliding her cutoffs down her thighs, caressing the backs of her knees and calves with his nails as he pulled them over one foot and then the other. She leaned toward him to scoot back into his lap, but he stopped her with his broad hand planted against her chest. Confused she looked up to find his eyes burning, deep and fathomless, waiting for hers. Without breaking eye contact, he gently pushed her back against the table, pulling each of her legs over his shoulders. Propped on her elbows, she watched him as he placed a soft kiss on the inside of each thigh.

As he kissed his way up her inner thigh, he mumbled into her skin, "You tell me if I should stop." And she did feel like she should stop him. If anyone deserved to be pleasured and worshiped here it was him. But his eyes were on fire and his cheeks flushed pink with a desire so pure and fervent it was undeniable. The first gentle swipe of his tongue left her quivering, her entire body quaking with hunger.

Since Prim had died, orgasms had lost their intensity. She still came and it felt good, but the pleasure had been muted to a prosaic, somewhat anticlimactic, release. It made sense to her that something had broken, that her body had dulled the depths, and correspondingly the peaks, in a bid for survival. But as Peeta’s mouth devoured her, licking and sucking like he was dying of thirst and she was an oasis, she was stunned at the ferocity of the pleasure wracking her body. It was liquid fire burning through her veins, turning her limbs molten with pulsing need.

She gripped the edge of the table, digging her nails into the wood, almost fearing the bliss that was ripping through her body. Then Peeta worked two thick fingers into her trembling body and she keened as the combination of sensations sent her sailing over the edge. She cried out, something she’d never done during sex, as the pleasure coursed through her in waves of ecstasy spreading from her core to the tips of her toes.

She was still panting, gripping the table as if it was the only thing tethering her to the physical world when Peeta stood and scooped her up into his arms. She wanted to protest, to insist that he put her down as he carried her bridal-style up the stairs, but she just wove her arms around him and burrowed her face into the hot skin his neck.

Sitting her gently on the bed, he took a step away from her and she realized that she was still wearing her tank top and quickly peeled it off. She watched as Peeta removed a condom from his wallet and set it on the bedside table, as if it was an option whether they had sex rather than the most important thing in the world.

Through the lingering haze of gauzy pleasure, she realized it was her turn to act. She sat forward and began to unbutton his jeans. He reached behind him, pulling his t-shirt off over his head. She wanted to make him feel as worshiped as he had made her feel, but right now she needed him inside of her.

She discovered that he loved with his whole body. She was overwhelmed by the sensations of him, his thick leg pushing between hers, the fingertips of one hand running from her hip, over the sensitive skin of her rib cage to her breast, rolling her peaked nipple between his fingers, his other hand tangled in her hair as he tugged lightly to expose the column of her neck to his mouth, his hot breath ghosting over her over sensitized skin. The shock of losing contact with him as he slid on the condom made her realize she needed to savor every second of their time together. By the time his fingers parted her folds, she was dizzy with need.

"Please, Peeta," she begged, too intoxicated by him to feel ashamed of the raw, pleading tone in her voice, "now. I need you now." The small groan of unrestrained rapture he made in response nearly undid her. She had meant to say "fuck me", to cheapen this, restrict it to a physical act, but it was so clearly a lie that she couldn't choke the words out. And then he was pushing into her and his eyes were inches away and glazed in pleasure and her whole body was trembling on the verge of abandon. It was too much, she closed her eyes and savored the feel of him.

“Kat-, oh Katniss, you feel so fucking good,” he gasped as he slowed his thrusts, obviously trying to regain some control.

“Don’t! Don’t stop. Please, please,” she was begging, but she didn’t care. She wanted him wild and unrestrained.

His nostrils were flared and his eyes hazy with lust when he demanded, “Then look at me.”

She did and when she focused, staring into his eyes, he began to drive into her relentlessly, perfectly. She watched his jaw clench, the cords of neck straining as grunted deliciously.

“I can’t- I’m, oh fuck!” he ground out and then he was coming.

His pleasure ignited something in her and without knowing it was going to happen, she was coming too. She moaned and pulsed around him, as he rocked gently into her, savoring every blissful aftershock.

With his arms still braced on either side of her, he placed a feather soft kiss on her lips. Then, he stood and pushed the window open before collapsing beside her on the bed and throwing an arm over his eyes. Turning on her side, she gently pulled it away from his face. They just stared at each other, eyes roaming hungrily over the other’s features. And then he gave her that smile again, so genuinely sweet with just the right touch of shyness, that unexpected warmth rushed through her. She ran a fingertip over his sweaty brow and down along his jaw. She could feel the scratch of the day’s stubble under the pad of her finger, another reminder of the man he had become, and was shocked at how much she wanted him again.

“Will you ask me to come with you?” he asked. The cautious hopefulness in his voice made her heart clench.

“Will you ask me to stay?”

“I feel like that’s all I’ve been doing since you tried to sneak out of the bakery yesterday.” He kissed her fingertip. “Will you stay?”

“I want to. I just don’t know if I can.”

His eyes shuttered then, losing some of the naked vulnerability, which she both appreciated and despised. He nodded and rolled over onto his back. She scooted into his side and he allowed her pillow her head on his chest. And in that moment, with the cool breeze blowing through the window, the feel of clean, sun-dried sheets under her bare skin and his solid warmth beside her, she couldn’t understand how she could possibly make herself leave.

When she awoke, the predawn light filtering in through the window made his hair look silver. She lay beside him, watching him, admiring the intimate details of him: the fleshiness of his earlobe, the freckles that dotted his shoulders, the trail of coarse hair running down the plane of his belly. She watched as the light changed to pink, turning his curls rose gold. She loved him. She probably always had, but there was no denying it now. As the swell of love for him crested in her heart, she felt the ebbing pull of terror that she would lose him. That the losses would be too great and she would lose herself too. Maybe for good this time.

She watched him sleep, the reliable rise and fall of his beautiful chest, the flutter of his impossibly long eyelashes. As she lost herself in the beauty of him, the constant buzz of pain, the ever-present static that she'd carried with her since the day Prim had died, came into acute focus as if tuned in on a radio dial: I want this, she thought. It was so clear and undeniable, it resonated, echoing through the expansive emptiness of her soul.

Without warning, his breath cut off in a ragged gasp, then stopped altogether, his body rigid. His arm shot out to the side, grasping her thigh, she didn't dare move. He sucked in a shaky breath and turned, wrapping a heavy arm around her waist, a heavenly anchor tying her to this time and place. There was nothing better in this world than sleeping next to his warm, solid body, he was comfort personified. With the realization that she never wanted to be anywhere else, she slipped back to sleep.

When she woke again, sun streaming through the window like lost time, he was gone. She told herself that she expected it, that she absolutely deserved it, but it still hurt more than she wanted to admit.

As she lay there alone, in a bed she feared would always seem too big without him beside her, the truth bloomed in her heart. She didn't just want Peeta’s forgiveness, she wanted all of him. She loved him. Really, truly loved him. And if she was terrifyingly honest with herself, she had to admit that she wanted to see what happened next. She wanted to stay.

The moment she let herself accept this, a whole new life unspooled through her mindseye. Her neighbor Hazelle dispensing the best maternal advice as they folded a mountain of laundry together at the Hawthorne's kitchen table. Hazelle’s daughter, Posy, now the same age as Prim had been was when she died, chattering excitedly about high school. Old Sae squeezing her hand across the diner counter because neither of them were very good with words. Saturday farmers market visits with Madge, watching her inhale the scent of the strawberries she loved so much.

She thought of the songs she would write on her own porch, the steps of which were the perfect height for perching a guitar on her knee. She could finally sing about her sister, her dad, her mother, and not just their absence. Because even though she'd lost them, she didn't love them any less.

And Peeta, kind, wonderful, mind-bendingly beautiful Peeta. The thought of staring at him across the kitchen table as he chatted about his day or waking up every morning wrapped in his arms, his heartbeat a percussive melody, an endless chant, alive, alive, alive against her ear, made her heart stutter with longing.

She grabbed her keys, and without allowing herself to think about it, she went after him.

She pushed into the bakery, trying to ignore how good it felt to be in a place that was so him. But is wasn’t him behind the counter.

“Well, well, if it isn’t our hometown celebrity, Ms. Katniss Everdeen.” Katniss was not in the mood for Peeta’s older brother or the cold-eyed stare he was giving her. She knew she’d hurt Peeta, she didn’t need his surly face to remind her. If she had learned anything in the past few years, it was that whatever was between her and Peeta, it was nobody else’s business.

“Peeta around?” she said with her best take-no-shit stare.

He looked at her for a moment, possibly weighing whether to tell her, possibly just making her wait, before he gestured back with a bob of his head. “Back dock.”

With a quick nod of thanks she headed around back to the loading dock. It was a remnant from Peeta’s father’s day, a raised wooden deck behind the bakery where trucks could be unloaded without having to carry the cargo up stairs.

She wasn’t prepared for the rush of affection and relief that rolled through her at the sight of him. She realized that a part of her expected him to have left this time. But there he was, hefting hundred-pound bags of flour onto a cart in all of his golden glory. When he saw her, his sweaty face broke into a grin and her heart melted a little.

“Lemme guess, you got hungry,” he said, a teasing tone that tried to cover up that the other option was that she’d come to say goodbye.

“I wasn’t sure where you…” She suddenly felt ridiculous for having chased him down. He probably needed the time to think.

“Didn’t you get my note?” he asked, wiping a forearm across his sweaty brow. “I left it on the kitchen table.”

She shook her head, feeling even more foolish. In her panic that he’d gone, she hadn’t looked.

“Delivery day,” he grunted, tossing an enormous bag over his shoulder, “I needed to meet the truck.”

“That’s still your job?” She remembered all the women in town finding an excuse to wander by the back of the bakery on delivery day.

He shrugged. “Doesn’t matter if I’m almost twenty-four, I’m still the youngest.”

He was dusted with a fine sheen of flour. It was trapped in the lines on his neck, the curls at his nape and in his impossibly long eyelashes, making them look colorless. She needed to touch him.

She cleared her throat, trying to quell the anxiety that threatened to close her windpipe. “Wanna have dinner with me tonight?”

He squinted at her, grinning. "Yeah."

"How about tomorrow night?" she asked.

He hoisted the last bag of flour into the cart and pulled a rag out of his back pocket to wipe the sweat from his flushed face. "I'd love that."

"And again the night after that?"

He hopped off the loading dock and stood right in front of her. "Katniss, don't mess with me. Are you...?"

"I'm gonna try sticking around for awhile. Do you think we can give this,” she reached for his hand, “a real shot?"

He looked at her, into her, with his eyes glinting like chipped sea glass, then stepped so close to her that she had to tilt her head up to see his face.

“You don't get it, Katniss. I want to be wherever you are - period. If you’ll have me, I’m already there. I won’t spend another five years of my life missing you. I love you, it’s just that simple.”

Could it be simple? Could it be possible to allow yourself to be happy and whole when the people you loved most were cold in the ground? As she looked between those unbelievably blue eyes, so full of hope and longing, she realized it was not only possible, it was the only way to honor them.

She reached up on her tiptoes to brush a kiss across his lips. All of sudden, she couldn’t wait to get him alone. “Are you almost done?”

He tipped her chin up, pressing another soft kiss to her lips as his fingertips slid down her jaw to caress her neck. She shivered deliciously under his touch.

“I just need to grab half a dozen cheese buns,” he grinned at her. “My girl kinda has a thing for them.”

“Do that,” she agreed, her mouth already watering in anticipation. “Then let’s go home.”


End file.
